Some Monday morning thoughts

Renée Schafer Horton
|
Apr. 18, 2011
NCR Today

Some Monday morning thoughts:

This story[1], a year old, was sent to me via a priest in Las Vegas and it certainly raises a number of questions regarding premature pronouncements of death in the cases of very early-term babies. A video of the miraculous recovery[2] of a baby pronounced dead shortly after birth also makes one wonder if obstetricians listen closely enough to the mothers in their care, since the doctor insisted for two hours that the baby was not alive.

The movie "Soul Surfer" came out about a week ago and CNN's "Belief Blog" editor has an interesting article about the behind-the-scenes fight [3]over how much faith was too much for a movie. The movie tells the true story of champion surfer Bethany Hamilton coming back to the sport after being attacked by a shark and losing one of her limbs. The fight over if the name of Jesus could be used in a movie about an evangelical Christian is revealing -- and ridiculous. Of course a story about an evangelical will include copious references to Jesus; if not, it wouldn't be accurate. But apparently (and perhaps expected), Hollywood isn't all that interested in accuracy, even in "true-life" stories. As one person explained, "Hollywood screams for freedom of speech but only if you agree with them. It's a very two-faced industry."

Finally, does it bug anyone besides me that the worst-case scenario punishment for Bishop-and-sexual-offender Roger Vangheluwe[4] is removal from the priesthood when Fr. Roy Bourgeois'[5] was excommunicated for refusing to recant his public support of women's ordination?

Let's see: one is a priest acting in direct -- but peaceful and non-sexually-abusive -- defiance of the Church's long-held tradition that women cannot be ordained the priesthood. The other is a bishop admitting publicly that he sexually abused not one, but two, of his young nephews, one of them for 13 years. (See the reporting of the TV interview here[6].) The first is a priest trying to help adult women follow a call to priesthood; the second is a bishop dragging children through hell. The first is a priest insisting that his Church listen to adult women; the second is a bishop insisting that his Church dismiss what the now-adults say happened to them as children.